Declining the Stereotype: Ethnicity and Representation in French Cultures (review)

Mireille Rosello, Declining the Stereotype: Ethnicity and Representation in French Cultures. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 1998. 272 pp.

The encounter between different races, religions, and cultures in the banlieues françaises (the French suburbs) is the main foundation of French ethnic stereotyping. Focusing on contemporary documents written in French, Mireille Rosello makes a contribution to a field much explored in our days: the stereotyping of the ethnic Other, with its dangers and uses. She presents a critical account of the ways Jewish communities, North African communities (immigrants and beurs), and black communities are represented or represent themselves in novels, films, sociological studies, and the media.

According to Rosello, we have all been, at some point, "reluctant witnesses," finding ourselves in the middle of a stereotyped discussion we had rather not condone. Rosello tries to help us, as readers, inseparable from the cultural, political, and social lives of our nation and its history, as members of a divided community, and as potential "reluctant witnesses," to answer not only the question of what can I do against stereotypes? but also, what can I do with a stereotype? or even "how can I address the issue of ethnic stereotyping?"

With this in view, Rosello draws on previous research to address the question of what a stereotype really is, literally speaking, and why it has been so successful during the second half of the nineteen century. She reminds us that, etymologically, a stereotype is a typographic technique for the reproduction of the same page over and over again, a page that contains not only words but also ideas, ideologies, and ways of thinking. This process of copying facilitates the transmission of ideas, images, and concepts while freezing a certain stage of textual production. Now, apropos stereotypes, we seek to get rid of those ideas that have become worn-out and irrelevant.

The stereotyping process turns the text into an image. According to Rosello, the cultural production of images and of texts cannot be studied independently. Text and image not only supplement each other, they also build increasingly complex layers of interpretation. Rosello illustrates this from a poster that shows a white man in uniform chasing a black man in civilian clothing with a text reading: "Another example of police prejudice or another example of yours?" And in small print: "Do you see a policeman chasing a criminal or a policeman harassing an innocent person? Wrong both times. It's two police officers, one in plain clothes, chasing a third party." It is no coincidence that the black man is represented as running ahead of the white man and without a uniform. This demonstrates that the use of race and its interpretation is far from irrelevant.

How long does it take to erase such a stereotype or any stereotype for that matter? Can it be done?

Stereotypes are very easy to identify, quote, and denounce and yet seem impossible to eliminate. Simply reading texts that denounce stereotypes is in itself a successful enterprise of reappropriation. However, Rosello insists that stereotypes need not be taboo as long as we recognize that they can be highly dangerous rhetorical tools and that we should treat them, as she says, "like bottles of poison in a kitchen cabinet" (34). If the use of stereotypes is controlled and accompanied by metadiscourse, censorship is not always the best way to fight them.

But stereotypes are still conceived of as intruders, negative signs. In order to understand or even control the phenomenon, Rosello examines what makes stereotypes almost immortal. Stereotypes are memorable and timeless. They travel from mouth to mouth, from text to text, from discipline to discipline without losing their original shape or strength. An ethnic stereotype is like a form of contamination, and repeating a stereotype is always favoring it, empowering it. Even condemning a stereotyped statement means repeating it. However, avoiding or ignoring ethnic stereotypes does not make them go away and...